Risks from extreme weather events are mediated through state, civil society and individual action. We propose evolving social contracts as a primary mechanism by which adaptation to climate change proceeds. We use a natural experiment of policy and social contexts of the UK and Ireland affected by the same meteorological event and resultant flooding in November 2009. We analyse data from policy documents and from household surveys of 356 residents in western Ireland and northwest England.

As the world’s largest distributed store of fresh water, ground water plays a central part in sustaining ecosystems and enabling human adaptation to climate variability and change. The strategic importance of ground water for global water and food security will probably intensify under climate change as more frequent and intense climate extremes (droughts and floods) increase variability in precipitation, soil moisture and surface water.

High temperatures are associated with reduced crop yields and predictions for future warming have raised concerns regarding future productivity and food security. However, the extent to which adaptation can mitigate such heat-related losses remains unclear. Here we empirically demonstrate how maize is locally adapted to hot temperatures across US counties.

Doha marks the first stop on a roadmap to a post-2020 climate regime. The European Union could pave the way by building bridges with partners in key areas such as mitigation ambition, adaptation finance and deforestation.

Most lakes are oversaturated with CO2 and are net CO2 sources to the atmosphere, yet their contribution to the global carbon cycle is poorly constrained. Their CO2 excess is widely attributed to in-lake oxidation of terrestrially produced dissolved organic carbon5. Here we use data collected over 26 years to show that the CO2 in 20 lakes is primarily delivered directly through inflowing streams rather than being produced in situ by degradation of terrestrial carbon.

Current United Nations structures are highly inequitable and obstruct progress towards international climate policy cooperation.

Climate change is threatening global ecosystems through its impact on the survival of individual species and their ecological functions. Despite the important role of understorey plants in forest ecosystems, climate impact assessments on understorey plants and their role in supporting wildlife habitat are scarce in the literature. Here we assess climate-change impacts on understorey bamboo species with an emphasis on their ecological function as a food resource for endangered giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca).

Snow accumulation is critical for water availability in the Northern Hemisphere, raising concern that global warming could have important impacts on natural and human systems in snow-dependent regions. Although regional hydrologic changes have been observed, the time of emergence of extreme changes in snow accumulation and melt remains a key unknown for assessing climate-change impacts.

Groundwater recharge sustains the groundwater resources on which there is global dependence for drinking water and
irrigated agriculture. For many communities, groundwater is the only perennial source of water. Here, we present a newly
compiled 55-year record of groundwater-level observations in an aquifer of central Tanzania that reveals the highly episodic occurrence of recharge resulting from anomalously intense seasonal rainfall.

Strong evidence on climate change underscores the need for actions to reduce the impacts of sea-level rise. Global mean sea level may rise 0.18–0.48 m by mid-century and 0.5–1.4 m by the end of the century. Besides marine inundation, it is largely unrecognized that low-lying coastal areas may also be vulnerable to groundwater inundation, which is localized coastal-plain flooding due to a rise of the groundwater table with sea level.

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